Robinson Crusoe
Daniel Defoe
Daniel Defoe, born in 1660 to a family of Dissenters, was educated at a Dissenting academy where he studied both traditional and practical subjects.
Although his father wanted him to pursue a religious career, Defoe entered business, dealing with two bankruptcies. He became a journalist, writing for Whig papers and publishing The Review.
Under Queen Anne’s reign, his critical writings led to his imprisonment and public humiliation, which backfired when friends supported him.
After his release, Defoe became a secret agent and, in his later years, turned to writing novels like Robinson Crusoe and Moll Flanders.
Despite earning well, he faced financial troubles until his death in 1731.
Defoe’s novels
Daniel Defoe is considered the father of the English novel and a representative of the rising middle class, which sought to see their lives reflected in literature.
His narrative technique was groundbreaking, laying the foundation for the realistic novel.
Defoe’s novels are fictional autobiographies that pretend to be true stories, supported by biographical details from the protagonist and a preface asserting their authenticity.
His works focus on a single hero without a coherent plot and are characterised by a retrospective first-person narration, aligning the author’s perspective with the protagonist’s, and characters are analysed through their inner thoughts and actions.
Plot
In Daniel Defoe’s novel, the main character, Robinson Kreutznaer (anglicized as Crusoe), is born in York in 1632 to a German father and an English mother.
At 19, he leaves his comfortable middle-class life to seek fortune and adventure.
His first voyage takes him to Guinea, and his second results in his capture by Moorish pirates, though he escapes and is rescued by a Portuguese ship, which brings him to Brazil.
There, he becomes a plantation owner and, seeking more slaves, sets off for Africa but is shipwrecked on a deserted island, where he remains for 28 years.
He rebuilds a familiar society, keeps a diary, and wrestles with his beliefs.
After 12 years of solitude, he discovers a footprint and later encounters cannibals.
He rescues a prisoner naming him Friday, and later frees more prisoners, including Friday’s father.
The novel concludes with Robinson’s return to England, where he finds that his Brazilian plantation has made him wealthy.
The island
The island, where most of the story takes place, serves as the perfect setting for Robinson to prove his capabilities and demonstrate that he was saved by divine Providence.
On the island, Robinson builds a primitive empire, becoming a model of the English colonizer.
His time on the island is not a return to nature, but an opportunity to control and exploit it.
This allows him to showcase his ability to dominate and organize his environment, reinforcing his role as a self-sufficient colonizer.
The characters of Defoe
The story of Robinson Crusoe revolves around Robinson, a middle-class man seeking his own identity by not living up to his father’s expectations.
His act of disobedience leads to his isolation on an island following a shipwreck.
Rather than creating a new society, Robinson’s life on the island mirrors and glorifies the values of 18th-century England, such as mobility, material productivity, and individualism.
Defoe emphasizes that while God is the ultimate force, individuals can shape their destiny through action and labor, guided by faith.
Robinson’s pragmatic and rational approach is evident in his journal-keeping and the skills he acquires in various trades.
Friday, the first native character in the English novel, becomes a symbol of the colonized after Robinson rescues and educates him, teaching him Western culture and religious practices.
Style
The novel employs an objective approach to events by using clear and precise details.
Defoe focuses on describing the primary qualities of objects, such as their solidity, size, and number, while paying less attention to secondary qualities like colour, texture, or flavour.
The language used is simple, matter-of-fact, and concrete, reinforcing the sense of realism provided by the first-person narration.
Man Friday
Robinson Crusoe is the quintessential 18th-century Englishman, obsessed with profit and control.
After becoming a plantation owner in Brazil, he set off to acquire slaves in Africa, only to be stranded on an island where he didn’t reflect on nature or seek simplicity.
Instead, he constructed a crude empire that mirrored English society’s ideals of individualism, material gain, and rigid hierarchy.
When he encountered a native, he imposed his own worldview, renaming him, restricting his speech to “master,” “yes,” and “no,” and clothing him to fit an image of “civilized” Western man.
This wasn’t just a cultural exchange—it was the erasure of identity, an evident example of arrogance that assumed Western standards were universally superior.
In addition, modern-day America shows a similar intolerance, particularly toward those who don’t speak English.
The attitude that English is the only language worth knowing or using—rejecting others as if they’re irrelevant—reveals a persistence of this colonial arrogance, shaping an exclusionary view of what it means to be “civilized” even today.